Your Beauty is Within
We are surrounded by different beauty standards, but we should always remember that beauty is not something that you see, but rather, it is something that a person exhibits. Find out here how beauty standards affect people, more particularly, the youth, today.
In our world today, we can say that almost everyone is online. The internet is a global computer network where we can find the information we need within seconds.
According to Dave Chaffey, there are 4.214B people in Asia, with 104.9M of these being Filipino. And despite our country’s poor internet speed, 63% of Filipino (or at least 67M) use the internet for at least 9 hours and 29 minutes a day. This is the reason why the Philippines is twelfth amongst the top internet users in the whole world.
Within this population, it is reported that the most frequent users are those from grade school (26%) and high school (56%). With the frequent use of the internet, it is inevitable that people will also see things which may not be good for them. And one prime example of this are beauty standards which the media portrays.
In our country, a lot of people are affected because of these beauty standards which propagate images and ideas that say what “beautiful” is. Some examples of the beauty standards in the Philippines are: having white or fairer skin, being tall and thin, as well as having a high nose bridge.
Because of this, teenagers experience various psychological effects. Some experience body dysmorphic disorder, which is when an individual cannot help but nitpick on the “flaws” that they have on their body. This may also lead to anorexia, which is when people purposely lessen the food that they eat in an unhealthy manner; so much so that some go on for days without eating.
It may even lead to bulimia, wherein after eating their fill, people force themselves to vomit the food that they have eaten. This can be seen as a form of self-harm. However, this is only one of the effects which the disorders stated may lead to. It may even eventually lead to Depression.
There are small, but vital things which we can do to people who experience these things. We should help stop propagating these beauty standards our society has, and instead send out the message that beauty is not equated to how a person weighs or how they look. Beauty is found in how a person treats other people. It is found in their passion for the different advocacies that they have in their life. It may be cliche, but it is true that beauty is found within.